lifelong knitter

Weather update

Unless you are a huge fan of horizontal rain, blustery wind, falling tree limbs and soul-sucking GRAYness...yesterday was not pretty. I should have been hunkered down. I was NOT. I'm prepared, mind you, make no mistake about that. I have always had an emergency kit (growing up in earthquake country where the power went out for weeks every winter....never mind) and I know where it is and how to use it. Having said that, yesterday I baked an apple pie. My studio partner brought me back five fabulous apples from Upstate New York and there they were...sitting on the stainless steel counter top singing Pie Songs.
OMG. I have to call her and find out their provenance. FABULOUS. So sweet they don't NEED sugar, but hey, I aint messin with the mojo that IS Marcia's famous pie recipe....so NOW I am sitting here in my jammies with a cup of strong coffee and a piece of (wait that would be crumbs of...sweet, flakey, fabulous crumbs of...) PIE for breakfast.
Today the sky is a glorious BLUE, as it always is after these *episodes*, and I am mapping out my strategy for the day. Things that were cancelled due to weather must be rescheduled, without conflicting with things already on the urgent cannot be cancelled list...sigh. I stayed up WAY too late casting on KOIGU (need I say more) for the mitred square panel from VK....I'm telling myself I'm just gonna knit ONE and see how I like it. YEAH. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. *hee* Stay tuned.
My morning was highlighted by awakening to some fabulous email. WOW. I've spent my life up to this point convinced that I was forever going to be the rhomboidal peg in the square hole that is near normalcy...and NOW I feel kinda...like I've found my TRIBE. Thank You!
This is Danger Girl
reporting from the Vintage Fountain Pen Italian handmade paper Book of the Month CLUB.....
WRITE ON!

Black Velvet

Gotta keep this short cuz we are under a Tornado Warning. Why I am blogging when I should be hunkered down away from windows is a testament to how I feel about this community of Friends....
I wore a Black Velvet pantsuit, tango shoes, and ate marscapone cream covered chocolate for dessert.....danced to Gypsy Swing music out in the hallway and loved the fact that the absolutely adorable fiddle player winked at my daughter....
BUT. sigh.
The restaraunt is a converted wharehouse space, packed with people as this was the night all the restaraunts in *town* donate ten percent to the Interfaith Council to feed the hungry....
so while I was thrilled that it was busy and the food was great, the acoustics were terrible.
sigh.
Yikes. Pets are doing the pre-storm freak out drill....
This is Danger Girl
reporting LIVE for the Weather Channel..........

Alrighty then

I'm a GrownUp. Here's how I know....got a surgery date and my DAUGHTER who is about to turn 21 says "let me put that on my calendar". O.M.G. How could this be? I don't FEEL any different than I did when I was 19. Seriously. I still have no idea what I want to be when I grow up, (still trying on the writer, artist, musician, therapist, gardener, outfielder for the San Francisco Giants HATS) but apparently somewhere along the way, on this marvellous adventure that is my life, I did. I grew up. WOW.
YES, you read that right. I have a date. With a gorgeous, very famous, doctor/mensch. (Just thought I'd make my Mother und de Yentala KVELL....) ok, ok, so it's not THAT kind of date. He's going to be holding really really sharp surgical instruments and I am going to be in LA LA land.....
For those of you who are organized and meticulous like my daughter (she doesn't get it from ME, folks...) you can mark it down. December 11th. The 11th, RACHAEL...*hee*
Alrighty now, I can hear the whispering....she doesn't sound very grownup to me.....and right you are!
I have the wardrobe and the credentials, and Lord knows, chronologically speaking, I qualify.
I can drive myself where I need to go (including crazy) and write notes to the principal or the Board of Directors. I'm still really really bad at Thank You notes, though. I compose these fabulous notes in my head, but usually get distracted by some other project before I find the stationery and the fabulous pen....
wait, where was I?
Oh yeah, the Grownup thing. I'll get back to you on that.
Tonight I'm going to hear a gypsy jazz swing band...
details, tomorrow.
This is Danger Girl, over and OUT!

Seriously, now

What is it about wearing black leather boots that makes people take me so much more seriously? *Hee*
I wore my "take me seriously, or else" clothes today...black turtleneck, black jacket, black tweed pants and those BOOTS.....I felt about two inches taller, and not quite so *blonde*.
Useful when you are dealing with head researchers on big projects....Nobody patted me on the head (or anywhere else) nor called me "hon".
Anyhoo...the BIG news of the day is that I had my first visit with the boy bird and he looks Great, is happy, relaxed, and his room is immaculate. WOW.
We had such a fun afternoon, sister bird was most impressed, and when it was time to head back, he said, "ok" and kissed me goodbye. Went straight to his room to open his mail.
WOW. WOW.WOW.
I am walking on Cloud Nine. He is so grown up, so independent, and everybody loves working with him. I am most abundantly Blessed!
See me do the Happy Dance of Joy!
Oh yeah, and the back of the cashmere tank is finished....YUM.
Life don't get much better than this, folks.
Hope your corner of the world is showered with blessings as well...

New Day Dawns

Yesterday was amazing. Although I broke down sobbing several times, it was a really great release of grief. I needed to do it my own way, in my own time. Danger Girl went looking for her Daddy in all of the usual hang out spots. Even though I am three thousand miles away from the physical places we went together...I tried to recreate a Saturday with my Daddy.
I woke up, had coffee and made the shrine. Sobbed uncontrollably for awhile. Took a shower, got dressed and took daughter to the library to do her research paper for Theatre Appreciation. Went to McDonald's and had a Big Mac. When the original Golden Arches opened in My Home Town....we went as a family, out to dinner. It seems like yesterday. My Daddy had a Big Mac. Yesterday I tried to eat one with him. ICK. My body revolted the rest of the day. Note to self...you don't EAT those things, WHAT were you THINKING?
Next I went to Radio Shack. This is where I go to conjure my Daddy's spirit. He is a regular at the Shack, and I always imagine that he still pops in occasionally for some needle nose pliers or some solder. Sigh.
All those little bins of electrical doo-dads...and YES, I do know all the technical names for them and what they are for, but as a little girl they were doo-dads....cuz DADS, DO stuff with them. Oh brother.
Next, I went to the music store. Looked at the saxaphones, listened to the musicians wandering in to play the pianos and guitars and perused the sheet music. When there was a lull in customer traffic, I asked the manager if he would play something for me. Told him the situation. He went back into the vault and got the Holy Grail and played it for me. First on the acoustic amp, which was lovely, but THEN, oh baby, plug that thang into the twin reverb amp and make my knees weak. This is the guitar of my dreams. It is part of the historical collection, a hybrid of the Gibson L5....and oh yeah, it's BLONDE. It has never been played in the years the manager has been there.....and he was overjoyed to play it for me. I could just barely make out a shadow of a smile in the corner...leaning back against the wall, eyes closed, foot tapping, hey Daddy.
I know if he had been able, that guitar would be home with me right now. Watched it go back into the fuschia silk covered case which looks uncannily like a coffin...
Sat out in the truck and sobbed for a long time.
Went to my studio and took out my Dad's mechanical drafting pencils and drew volumes of cones and parallelograms, and all of the usual warmup exercises for technical drawing. I could smell the unfiltered camels and the prell shampoo and the 30 weight oil that IS my Daddy. Looked through his original drawings from Engineering School in Switzerland (which is why we lived in Zurich, for those of you trying to keep track), his lab notes in precise swiss script.
More weeping, then back to the library to pick up my daughter. She is not quite finished with her paper, so I sit and knit in the big red leather chair that always makes me feel like I'm five years old. It is just TOO big for me. It's a Papa bear chair.
Home for dinner, I get the call that the flowers have been delivered to him. More sobbing. I WANT TO BE THERE. sigh. I light the candle at the shrine and pray.
Play the guitar (the green one, NOT the Holy Grail) until my fingers just can't do it anymore. Work out a reasonable facsimile of The Shadow of Your Smile. One of these days, I am going to play that and record it and dedicate to my Daddy.
Now I am feeling better, I knit some more, do some paperwork, a little reading (about Physics) and fall asleep to dream about running through fields of swiss wildflowers, and throwing my arms around my friends the sheep, I turn my face to the sky to drink in the LIGHT. My Daddy takes my picture.
All is well.
So May it Be
For you, this day as always.
PEACE be with you.

Roses and remembrance

I miss my DADDY! This is going to be a rough day. The weather of course is cooperating dramatically....cold wet rainy dreary....even the trees are weeping with me.
I need to go KNIT something warm and fuzzy!

Daddy and Danger Girl

"Zeit su gehen, liebchen, mach SCHNELL!" This is how we got "to town" in the early years....so if anybody tells you that story about having to walk ten miles in the snow.....c'est vrai!

Nesting Instinct

Here for your drooling pleasure, we have the latest gatherings for my (sob) emptyish nest....
The green wound balls are luscious hand dyed merino superwash, destined to be something raglan for moi with tiny baby cables. Next to that we have the bargain (2 bucks) cone of Harrisville tweed....couldn't resist THAT! Next is the PLUSH....swatched for scarves for Quilt Ladies Christmas Gifts... (shhhhhh, don't tell!)
In the front row (left to right) we have koigu and alpaca. Sigh. YUM. For fondling, mostly. I want to try the mitred squares with the koigu, or maybe I'll break down and order more and make the Charlotte's web shawl. Any helpful hints for the alpaca?
The cashmere tank is simply dreamy to knit. I may unravel it and knit it again just for the sheer pleasure factor....froggin' never looked so good!
Hope your weekend is Knitty!

Beethoven, baby

I had to leave the house this morning and force myself to get things done so that my fingers wouldn't bleed from playing too much Beethoven. Fur Elise...(sigh)
Ode To Joy, played as a round with the computer files set on repeat...
Stille Nacht at midnite in a dark house with the wind howling outside...
I'm hopelessly smitten.
Saturday is the anniversary of my Daddy's death.
THERE. I said it.
I miss him daily, but now I don't sob as much or as often...I smile in remembrance and get wistful when I hear certain reminders.
Yesterday one of those strong memories came up, and I have to share it. Pictures of Koigu and other knitting content tomorrow, I promise.
When I was really small and we lived in an apartment in Zurich, we had a stuffed toy Dachshund. No real doggies allowed in the apartment. Alas. Poor princess pouted, to no avail. Papa explained that if I could take really really good care of Mister Doggie in the aprtment, PERHAPS when we moved back to the States I could have my very own REAL doggie. That little stuffed dachshund (they were originally developed to hunt BADGERS dontcha know...) got loved within an inch of its life. I fussed over it, checked on it, carried it around. Told it stories of Famous Doggies and their Princesses...knit itsy bitsy sweaters and matching hats! Lectured him about the dangers of short legged doggies going out in the snow alone....
The time came to move back to the States, and one thing led to another, and Danger Girl did indeed get her own little doggie, and lots of other doggies in her life after that, but Mister Doggie the stuffed doxie lived in my Daddy's office for years and years and years. Now nobody can remember exactly when or under what mysterious circumstances Mister Doggie ceased to be....perhaps he just crumbled into dust after so much loving....
Yesterday I saw the Sprint Commercial about a hundred head of oxen....and the resulting dachshund stampede and I just laughed myself silly thinking how MUCH my Daddy would have loved it.
This is Danger Girl
reporting LIVE...
for Animal Planet...
can you hear me NOW?

Happy Camper

So today, I went back to the music store with Danger Girl and lookee what we brought home...a new BABY! Also please note the fabulous new glasses which allow me to actually see my fingers caressing the strings. A parlor sized guitar. The sound is so Open and Resonant, I can hardly keep my hands off of it...but to avoid getting blisters on the fingers which have not touched a guitar in 30 years....I am soothing them with......